The Rundown: Werewolf Hunter X is a retro style 2d crafting survival and sandbox game that is currently in development by SeaCreatureSandwich, and boasts unique item building, procedural generation, rogue-like resource scarcity, mythical monsters, and much more.

Game Mechanics:The unique Item Design mechanic allows the player to create, and share custom items in game time.This can be handy for getting out of sticky situations. Stuck in a pit? Build a ladder! About to go into battle? Build a sword!Want that sword to be made of Spaghetti noodles? That’s up to you. Material properties directly affect the player and the game world around them, so building armor out of lava is not recommended. There is no limit to what you can create when you design the items yourself!

Day and night cycle mechanics are also featured with persistent time, as well as weather mechanics, and player stats and buffs such as: Energy, speed and health.

​The Recipe Design Mechanic: The design room can be accessed at any point during the game. This is where the player will pick the item’s ingredients, shapes, colors, review the potential item stats, give the item a name and create the recipe. Save your design and then return to your adventure to create it, all in real time.

The Story:A long time ago the planet called Earth was destroyed. The final act of the human race as Earthlings was to build four massive ships that would hold the sum of our kind. The ships were sent out into the far reaches of the universe in hopes that we might find a new home for mankind.

Roughly twenty two hundred years later one did! The planet was 98% compatible. Until then the best rating had been less than 5%. The planet's original inhabitants seemed to have suffered a species ending event that left the planet more or less intact.

After a thorough assessment while in orbit we landed and began to colonize. Our disassembled ship became strong walls around the colony, keeping out the wandering, ruthless monsters that were the shadows of the planet's previous tenants.

A message was sent to the other three ships so that they could make their way to Humanities new home, as they had all planned so long ago.

Now, we are left to prepare for their arrival. We must build our small colony into a great empire, fight off the demons of the new world, and conquer the unruly landscape of our new home.

Dev Blog:​​

Post 3 – Concept Demo Full Walkthrough

Decided to make a walkthrough video of the current concept demo. As you can see things are coming along.

​Post 2 – Concept Demo

A small playable demo is currently in the works that will demonstrate the basic ideas behind the main Item Creation mechanic.

The current goal of the demo is to have the player navigate out of a cave using only the ingredients around them.​Below you can find some early screenshots of our progress.

Post 1 - Static vs Procedural town design

This is not the first time that an indie dev has struggled with the pros and cons of procedurally generated game design, but it is the first time that I have really struggled with it, so I thought I’d write about that.

Because Hunter X takes place on a remote island there is only one town to start the game with. The rest of the map is procedurally generated, monster infested, unexplored and dangerous terrain. Taking that into consideration, the design of the one town has immense importance and I couldn’t wait to dive in. Before I could start working on the town I first had to decide if I planned to continue with the procedural design of the rest of the map, or sit down and design the town statically.

In the past I have opted for procedural design. I like it, and it's a great way to generate lots of “new content” very quickly saving time and resources. I feel like the player also gets more out of it in that way. Instead of the same old thing over again the player gets a fresh new adventure. ​Unfortunately, there is only so much design that can be put into a level if the designer doesn't know for certain when and where the player will encounter what obstacles. It might sound like a small issue, but that knowledge is what allows the designer to interact directly with the player. These missed interactions can add up over the duration of a players experience and can quickly result with them leaving your game with an empty and hollow feeling about it.

Ultimately the decision came down to the fact that there is only one town on the map and everything else would be procedurally generated content. I decided that the design of the town would be by hand. I feel that I can maximize my opportunities to interact and communicate with the player through the design of the town without sacrificing the feel that the forests, and mountains and sea will give the player of a random and endless insecurity of procedural design. After experiencing that I know that the static design of the town will provide the security and stability needed to allow the player to take a breath between adventures into the unknown. I guess we’ll see how that decision ends up won’t we?